Videos released by Islamic State have captured the attention of the world for years. But the media focus on its so-called 'slick, professional' video techniques runs the risk of mythologising the terrorist group.

Iraqi security forces detain a boy after removing a suicide vest from him in Kirkuk, Iraq.
REUTERS/Ako Rasheed23 août 2016

Profit estimates have ranged from $4 million to $7 billion. But with the Paris attacks costing only $10,000, does a number even matter?

Without the perfect-storm conditions of post-invasion insurgency, this most potent expression of al-Qaedaism yet would never have risen to dominate both the Middle East and the world in the way that it does.
Reuters/Stringer2 mars 2016

Record numbers of arrests of young Britons on suspicion of terrorism offences shows the need for a new and effective approach to online jihad.

Like their allies, New Zealand troops served in Afghanistan without the ‘Rolls Royce’ legal agreement now being demanded by some politicians for the upcoming joint mission with Australia in Iraq.
AAP/NZ Defence Force, CPL Sam Shepherd14 avril 2015

Even as the world was still trying to make sense of the Paris attacks, attention suddenly shifted towards Brussels with the news that two suspected jihadis had been killed in a police anti-terror raid…

ISIS is winning the propaganda war, it’s been said, and top brass from the European Commission, EU member state governments, and representatives of Google, Facebook, Twitter and Microsoft have met to discuss…

An Australian Super Hornet refuels from a KC30 tanker while flying over Iraq.
@VCDF_Australia/Twitter7 octobre 2014

There are two reasons why we should ignore the growing calls in the United States, Canada and Australia for Western “boots on ground” – meaning ground troops – to fight and destroy the Islamic State (IS…

Islamic State flags flown by militants in the east of the Syrian city of Kobanê, within sight of the Turkish border.
EPA/SEDAT SUNA7 octobre 2014

The black flag of ISIS has been sighted in the Syrian city of Kobanê. For three weeks, heavily armed ISIS gangs have advanced on Kobanê – also known as Ayn al-Arab – steadily pushing back the local YPG…

Known as White Rocks, this quartz outcrop was the site of a three-hour gun battle in 1915 between police and two Afghans, who had shot and killed picnickers leaving Broken Hill.
Amanda Slater/Flickr3 octobre 2014

It’s another hot Australian New Year’s Day, and 1200 people are aboard a train bound for a picnic when a burst of gunfire shatters the festive atmosphere. Police return fire, killing the attackers – but…

A Syrian boy sleeps on a blanket on the stony ground at a Turkish refugee camp.
EPA/SEDAT SUNA2 octobre 2014

Few people had heard of the Syrian town of Kobanê until recently. But since coming under sustained attack in the last fortnight by Islamic State (ISIS) militants, the town has attracted international attention…

Ever since arriving in Canberra in July, Senator Jacqui Lambie has had the media in a spin.
AAP Image/Alan Porritt25 septembre 2014

If a movie is ever made about the life of the well-known PUP senator from Tasmania, we can be sure it won’t be titled “Silence of the Lambie”. After a little over two months in public life, quiet and stillness…

US President Barack Obama announces the start of a campaign of allied airstrikes against Islamic State forces in Syria.
EPA/Win McNamee25 septembre 2014

Having secured some sort of tacit agreement with Damascus, the coalition bombing campaign inside Syria proper has begun in earnest. The US, France and an ambiguous array of allies is unleashing the bleeding…

Australian women of different faiths gathered at Sydney’s Lakemba Mosque last month in a show of community solidarity.
AAP Image/Tracey Nearmy19 septembre 2014

From anarchists in the 1920s and radical leftists in the 1960s, to fringe, extreme-right Christian bombers or gunmen in the United States in recent decades, or radical Islamists such as Islamic State today…

How much has Australia committed to fighting Islamic State? Australia has pledged 600 military personnel and up to eight Super Hornets, which is expected to cost up to $500 million per year. There has…